


The Story of Penda

by Kenzi_Ro



Category: Star Trek, Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Nyota is a BAMF, warning for reference to depression
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-20
Updated: 2013-02-20
Packaged: 2017-11-29 23:14:41
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,081
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/692645
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kenzi_Ro/pseuds/Kenzi_Ro
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In another universe, it might have been different.</p>
<p>In another universe, it might have been Nyota that died.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Story of Penda

**Author's Note:**

> This was originally written for a prompt on the Star Trek XI kink meme asking for a fic to explain why TOS!Uhura and Nu!Uhura have such different personalities.
> 
> Original prompt and story: http://st-xi-kink-meme.livejournal.com/11004.html?thread=9878780#t9878780

There is a picture that Nyota carries with her everywhere. She tucks it into her bra or boot to keep it close and sleeps with it under her pillow. She never shows it to anyone and she _never_ loses it.

It's been folded so many times that the creases are white and the colors are beginning to fade. The paper is almost soft in her hands, except for the missing corner where the charred edges still hold some sharpness.

Nyota can only vaguely remember the two adults in the picture. She remembers soft arms and the smell of sweat and smoke. She remembers a deep voice that rumbled in the chest and a light laugh that always flitted away on the wind. She knows their faces by heart, but she cannot remember more than a few snatches of memory about her parents.

But she remembers Penda. 

The girl waves out from next to Nyota in the picture. Her smile is beaming and Nyota can remember scowling at the bubbly attitude her sister contained. Penda was smiles and laughter and cheer where Nyota was grins and grumpy mutters. Penda could charm anyone with her neat dresses and perfect manners; their mother was always brushing dirt from Nyota and reminding her to say please and thank-you. Once, Nyota had said that she would give anything to be as perfect as Penda, but Penda had giggled and told her that if she was perfect like Penda than she couldn't beat the boys in the races or dance with the older women. 

Penda liked that her twin was wild and spirited, and always held her head up to dare the world to come against her.

Nyota likes that her twin is calm and quiet, and she is the perfect daughter so Nyota doesn't have to be. She stays in the house and does the chores and reads books on engineering in all sorts of languages and lets Nyota run free with the boys of their village.

Nyota keeps this one picture close to her so she never loses the image of her sister. Besides the picture, only an old copy of _'The Jungle Book'_ and the large gash across Nyota's back survived the fire.

Nyota cannot remember the night she lost her family. Just as she cannot remember anything from the first ten years of her life except her sister. She cannot remember their house catching flame in the middle of the night. She cannot remember what tore her back open and she cannot remember what knocked her unconscious.

She woke in her uncle's house with her cousin signing frantically and a deep sense of wrongness in the back of her chest. That is her first clear memory. She hadn't cried when they told her what happened. She asked them to tell her of the family she couldn't remember and the sister she had lost. She had sat in bed until her back was healed and the doctor cleared her to move. 

Then she ran. She ran until her head pounded and her back screamed in agony. She ran until she couldn't feel her legs and her uncle's town was only a smear of light on the horizon. She ran until the heaving of her chest made her stop and gasp for breath. Salty water stung her tongue and she didn't know what was sweat and what was tears.

Then the anger sets in. Anger for the fire that burned their house. Anger for her parents inability to get out. Anger at Penda for dying. Anger at herself for living.

It should have been Penda that survived. Penda had been the one with everything in front of her. Penda was the good child with a bright future. Penda was the one that everyone adored. Penda was the one that could charm and make friends.

Nyota was the wild child who ran until she couldn't run any more. Nyota was the one that people tutted about and shook their heads at. Nyota was the one that mumbled and kept in the shadows at gatherings.

Nyota wasn't the one that should have lived.

When she is twenty-one she applies to StarFleet. Penda had dreamed of StarFleet since they were children. She had wanted to be a great command officer and work with a ship. Nyota had not given it thought at the time. 

The Nyota that Christopher Pike interviews is barely recognizable as the wild girl from her earlier years. Her dress is wrinkle free and her hair secured in a difficult knot at the back of her neck. She sit with perfect poise and answers every question with a clear, firm voice. When asked she recited the first three lines of the StarFleet charter in every language she knows. She smiles and laughs and is the perfect choice for a cadet of the Academy.

She leaves and as soon as she's on the road she switches her shoes and runs home.

For ten years she has lived with her uncle. He calls her 'devil feet' and laughs when she runs around the village for fun. Her cousin taught her to sign and waves whenever she passes him.

For ten years, Nyota has been silently resurrecting Penda. Where most teenagers spend their awkward years dealing with pimples and growth spurts and possible sexuality crisis, Nyota spends them integrating her sister into herself. She teaches herself poise and grace and how to interact with people and charm them with a smile. She practices until she can smile without nerves. 

She grows her hair long because Penda had always had the longer hair. At twenty she changes her name to Nyota Penda Uhura. She becomes more like Penda everyday.

But she is still Nyota, the wild child. She never stops running and never looks down. She stands up against the boys of the village and keeps her own counsel. If she is wrapping herself in the mantle of Penda, it is around the core of iron will and determination that has always belonged solely to Nyota.

\--

She is Nyota and she is Penda. 

She is everything they could ever be. 

She catches the first shuttle to Iowa when she gets the news of her acceptance. She folds her clothes and packs her small suitcase. She tucks her picture into her bra and squares her shoulders. She is making Penda's dream come true if it kills her.

Gods have mercy on whatever poor soul tries to stand in her way.


End file.
